Question In Kant's metaphysics, he claims that the world of human experience (phenomena) is categorically different from things in themselves (noumena). He states that there is no reason to believe that the world as we experience it is the same as things are "in themselves." Doesn't the fact that the way we have experienced the world as human beings has led to evolutionary success reveal that while phenomena may not exactly duplicate noumena; it must certainly resemble it very much? The fact that we successfully manipulate the external world through our knowledge that comes from experience,seems to suggest that they way things are in themselves is very much like we experience them. Even to the extent that phenomena may give us a lot of information about how things are in themselves.

Accepted:
October 27, 2010

Comments

There is certainly something of Hume's reasoning in your question (see the end of section v of the first Enquiry). And, this way of thinking about knowledge becomes a basic definition of knowledge in pragmatism (Pierce, James et al). However, it is inappropriate in Kant. We must take what you term the categorical difference between things-in-themselves and appearances seriously. Appearances are the only domain of knowledge. This is not because appearances are what we are directly acquainted with, while things-in-themselves are in some way hidden. If that were the case, as you say, there would be good reason to think that the former would have to be correlated with the latter, and that through this correlation, the latter could come to be known. Rather, we should say that the thing-in-itself is such as to not be a possible object of knowledge. In other words, whatever forms of knowledge would be necessary to know a thing-in-itself (even talking about a 'form of knowledge' here is probably already going too far), that form of knowledge is impossible for any human mind.